And this commercial doesn’t show any actual victims either - it shows a couple of child actors reacting to a rather cartoony example of bad parenting. And while I don’t doubt there are parents out there who favor one child (though I did raise an eyebrow over the dopers in this thread who seem to think it’s common), I also doubt it occurs in situations like the AT&T ad.
Defense of what? Of their argument, of course. The back and forth tends to go like this:
“I think X about a particular subject regarding children.”
“Well, I think you’re wrong, and Y is actually true.”
“Do you have kids?”
“No.”
“Then you don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Olives already outlined the fallacy of that thinking quite nicely.
Will someone please be kind enough to summarize the commercial in the OP? The Powers That Be have blocked YouTube at my work and now you guys have me curious as well as slacking off.
It’s an AT&T commercial where the parents and older sister and younger brother are in the living room. The parents are trying to decide which child gets to choose what program to record. The parents say it should go to Jennifer since she is so pretty but brother has nice hair but Jennifer is so pretty and then the parents say, “Ok name which one if your favorite.” and they both say Jennifer and then dad repeats, “She’s so pretty.”
And spokesman comes on and says if you had AT&T U-Verse then everyone could record their shows.
Paraphrased: A mother and father are discussing which kid should get the last available recording spot on their Tivo. They start summing up their children by saying things like, “Jennifer is really great, but Kyle has that thick head of hair.” They then agree to say the child they love most at the count of three, and both say, “1,2,3, Jennifer!” They both laugh and praise her for a second, then sadly look over at Kyle, and the father says, “Or, we could give it to Kyle. It’s really all he’s got.”
The announcer says, “Don’t let this happen to you, blah blah blah, buy our crap.” It’s worth noting that while Jennifer looks appropriately smug at her parent’s praise, Kyle doesn’t really react as though he’s sad, or at all. The actor playing him looks about 6.
I have 2 kids, and have no problem with the commercial. I don’t find it “funny”, but I don’t find any commercials funny, because they’re written by hacks.
Weird stuff upsets kids, often for no understandable reason. You know what TV commercial screwed me up the most as a child? A Red Lobster butterfly shrimp commercial. I somehow convinced myself while watching that commercial that shrimp (and, by association, all seafood) was made out of butterflies. This horrified me and I wouldn’t touch it ever again despite having loved it previously. And by ever I mean EVER-I’m 29 and I still won’t eat seafood despite having since concluded that shrimp is not, in fact, made of butterflies. I gave myself a big enough complex over it that it has impacted my eating habits for damn near 25 years and even the smell of it is enough to turn my stomach now.
Would this AT&T commercial have upset me? Probably not, I would have known it was a joke and that my parents still loved me just as much as they ever did. Can I say that for sure looking back through the fog of time? No, absolutely not.
Children are going to get screwed up by random crap in their lives no matter how much we try to stop it and really a big part of life is learning to deal with the stuff that screwed you up, whether that be by learning to overcome those obstacles or avoiding those obstacles or just accepting that they are part of the amalgam of quirks that make up who you are as an adult. I hope when my daughter is old enough to be freaked out by something like that commercial that she will come and talk to me about it, but if she doesn’t I know I will have worked damn hard to give her the coping skills to deal with her problems and still manage to be a normal, functioning adult someday.
Sorry, but if your kids are really so fragile that they’ll suffer some sort of psychological stress from seeing a scenario like that acted out in a 30 second TV spot, you’re doing something terribly wrong.
Since when do kids need to be sheltered from the idea that casual injustice exists at all? Do you worry about what impact Cinderella has on them? All sorts of material specifically aimed at kids features children being cruelly treated by parental figures. This shouldn’t be a concern if you manage to ensure that they feel safe and loved in the home.
Can you explain your thought process on what harm you expect might come from this? Are you worried that it might plant some seed of doubt in a child about whether or not they are loved, in spite of whatever demonstrations they receive from mommy and daddy? Because that’s banana oil. If not… what, exactly?
In fifteen years when some horrible serial murder, animal torturer is brought to justice he will claim the AT&T U-verse defense, the commercial made him do it.
I watched it again with my wife. My opinion also remains unchanged. It’s funny. She thinks it’s funny too. She also laughed at my comment about our kid being the least favorite among all our kids.
I tried showing it to my daughter but I think she was too young to get it. She did laugh, though she pretty much laughs at anything these days.
Don’t worry mangeorge. When she gets a bit older, I’ll go back and find this video clip and show it to her. Then I’ll say “This is what mommy and daddy think about you.” Then I’ll take away her ice cream just for good measure.
This type of commercial is part of a new wave of “over the top” cluelessness to be funny.
Look at the cell phone ads like the one where the girl is breaking up with the guy, and she updates her Facebook page to show her status as single, then texts all her friends, then calls him, all while sitting in front of him. He’s questioning her about it, and she’s replying that it doesn’t cost anything for all those services, like that’s what he’s objecting to.
Or the one for the cell phone service advertising their “crazy” deal by using a chick who is stalking a guy. First she’s outside his window in a tree, taking pictures and following his twitter/Facebook/etc. Then she’s in his closet.
This is just one more case of using “don’t be like these people, but use our product anyway” commercials. The intent is to be funny so you remember the commercial, and thus the product. The message feels more like “we sell to assholes, douches, and crazy folk - please buy our product, and you can be one of them”.
I think the AT&T commercial is mildly amusing. I find the Ally Bank commercials to be brilliantly hilarious. I think deep, dark truths are a fantastic subject for humour.
You make a good point. I rarely tell people this but as a kid ,I didn’t care for Popeye much. I found it mildly disturbing how Brutus would take and keep Olive Oil against her will.
And this is a cartoon MADE for children FCOL! I mean seriously, 90% of those cartoons are basicaly about sexual assult! Yet a whole generation(s) of us came out just fine.